


when our eyes close

by littlelionvanz



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Scars, Self-Harm, Slurs, mentions of abuse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-07-08
Updated: 2015-01-19
Packaged: 2018-02-07 23:25:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1918026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littlelionvanz/pseuds/littlelionvanz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was weird, though. To fear the thing you loved. To teeter around the edges of the pool instead of diving right in. The fear lay in the uncertainty. The fact that he couldn’t control the outcome of whatever was going to happen here.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Title from ['Lightstick' by Zola Jesus](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WTtPRTxgqlE)

Ronan was afraid of Adam. There was no other way to say it. He was fucking scared of him. Scared of the way his hands shook when he was uncomfortable. Scared of the hard-set line of his jaw that seemed like he was trying so hard to keep together. He was scared of the ache inside his own chest that numbed him from face to toes. Ronan was scared of how beautiful he was. He was scared that Adam was breaking. But mostly, that he was going to be the one who broke him.

It was weird, though. To fear the thing you loved. To teeter around the edges of the pool instead of diving right in. The fear lay in the uncertainty. The fact that he couldn’t control the outcome of whatever was going to happen here.

Adam was staring at him, and that scared him too.

And that’s when Ronan understood it. Adam could hurt him. Bad. And _that’s_ what scared him shitless.

They were standing on the steps of St. Agnes. Ronan felt like he was on fire because neither of them were saying anything.

“What do you want, Ronan?”

He was dying. This is what dying feels like.

He was choking and suffocating and Adam was staring at him. He was close and too close. The sticky August air was caught in his throat and he suddenly felt the need to melt into the concrete.

Somehow he found enough words to say, “I don’t know.”

Adam said with eerie confidence, “Don’t lie.”

Ronan said, “I never lie.”

“You are right now.”

Adam was killing him. Every horrific agonizing second Adam stood away from him, tearing him apart with those dark sad eyes, it was killing him.

“What do _you_ want.” he bit back, hoping by some fraction that maybe he’d make Adam feel the same. But Ronan didn’t want that. Not really. He didn’t want Adam to feel the raw exposed pain that was etching itself into every nerve of his body. He didn’t want him to feel any pain at all. Ronan decided Adam had enough.

Adam’s eyes dropped some, his face faltering. He was crumbling. He was so tired.

“I want…” he was dragging something out of his own depths. “I just…”

Ronan took a step and it felt like crossing a mile to get to him.

“I want… to _feel_.”

Ronan looked down to see a shaking hand. Adam was terrified too. All he wanted in that moment was still the storm that was breaking inside of him. With tentative fingers he touched the backs of Adam’s hand. Just barely. Just enough to feel it.

Adam shook more and Ronan pulled away, like he’d broken something and wanted to be as far away from it as possible, as to not crack it any more. But when he did, Adam looked at him then, hard. But that harsh resolve slowly and immediately crumbled when tears spilled forward onto Adam’s cheeks. His eyebrows were screwed up and he was trying to keep his mouth straight and it was then that Ronan realized he’d never seen Adam cry. Adam _never _cried; of everyone that ever had a legitimate reason to, it was Adam. But he never did. He bottled it inside, like keeping a bomb next to his heart. Ronan could see that he wasn't sad about anything. Adam was just so _tired___

This is what heartbreak felt like.

There were pains in his life that Ronan had experienced. Some physical, some mostly mental. Some that left hollow reminders in his heart. But very few of them hurt him like this. It was pure subconscious instinct that made him reach out to touch Adam's shoulder. First a tentative touch to the bone, and then slowly curling his fingers around it when Adam didn't pull away, but seemed to sort of calm under the touch. The tears didn't stop when Ronan gently pulled him forward and pressed Adam against his chest.

Their heartbeats were rabid against each other. Adam dropped his head onto Ronan's shoulder when Ronan spread the palm of his hand flat between Adam's shoulder blades. Adam fit in the crook of Ronan's neck and that's where he let himself be held. His own arms remained at his side but it didn't matter to Ronan. His other arm was carefully placed on the back of Adam's head; his fingers accidentally slipping between his hair. His pinkie finger was gently kneading the crown of Adam's head.

It was only then did Ronan notice the height difference between them. Adam seemed so much smaller in Ronan's arms. Adam was making himself fit there and suddenly he was a child, stunted and deprived of even the most basic human contact. He was a dog, kicked and hurt too many times and sensitive to the most simple caress.

Ronan wanted to give him more. He would give him everything he had.

Adam shifted in such a way that Ronan felt paralyzed with the feeling of lips against his neck. Not entirely a kiss, but a gesture that couldn’t be ignored. He breath was hot and shallow against Ronan's throat, the spot just below his ear.

He didn't dare pull away. Not when Adam's hands rose, folded in on each other, and rested in the spot between their chests. Not when Adam's breath became heavier and those lips found the sharp angle of Ronan's jaw. He didn't move when the shaking stopped and one of Adam's hand found Ronan's collarbone. The hand Ronan kept on Adam’s back drifted further down to rest on the small space at the base of his spine.

"I dont-" Adam spoke in a fractured voice against Ronan's ear, "I just-"

Ronan pulled away just enough to look at his face; eyes red, lips slightly parted, a heartbreaking look of shame cast over his face, as if asking for something he didn’t deserve.

"I know," Ronan offered in the form of a whisper. "I know, Adam."

Ronan realized that the use of his first name made everything incredibly more intimate the second he said it. Adam realized it too because he pulled away then, just a few inches, and Ronan's heart curdled, thinking he ruined it. The tension in Adam melted a bit; Ronan realized this because he immediately realized he's never been around Adam when he was completely calm.

Adam felt so much more lax than Ronan had ever seen him. As if he was succumbing to a state he’d pushed back for too long.

He didn’t say anything, just stepped back, held Ronan’s gaze for a few moments, and reached for the handle of the church door.

 

Throughout the course of their Cabeswater adventures that had the boys returning home late, they knew how to sneak in and out of St. Agnes without disturbing the nuns. And that’s how they snuck in, on their toes, Ronan pressed close against Adam’s back, tennis shoes off and in their hands. When Ronan closed the door of the shamefully small apartment, Adam was already sitting on his bed. His hands were tight fists, Ronan couldn’t tell if he was shaking again or not.

Ronan stood just a few feet from him and didn’t know what to do.

That’s when Adam said, “Do you love me?”

He said it serious, and he said it sure. Ronan couldn’t look at him for a moment until he realized Adam wasn’t going to look away or change the subject. He forced himself to meet his gaze and steeled his jaw.

“Yeah.”

It was strange- Ronan thought Adam knew the answer already but just needed the confirmation. But Adam instead shook his head. He looked away and scrunched his face and denied it.

“No,” he said verbally pushing Ronan away. “No, no no no.”

Adam stood and Ronan couldn’t think of anything that would make him want to go near him at that moment.

“You _can’t_ ,” Adam was fighting something. “I’m _not...anything_.”

He was tense again, Ronan saw it. And for some reason that made him angry.

“Shut up, Parrish,” he snapped. The suddenness of it startled Adam. “Just fucking _stop_.”

“Stop what, Lynch.”

“Saying that shit about yourself. That you’re not anything.”

“But what if it’s true.” Adam’s eyes were glistening again. Ronan couldn’t handle being angry and seeing Adam cry in the same moment. He was entirely unsure of his emotional range at that point.

“It’s not,” Ronan said instead, sighing heavily and bringing a hand to his face so that he didn’t have to look at him.

Adam’s voice dropped, almost defeated. His shoulders fell slumped. He looked just sad.

“How do you know that.”

Ronan cocked his head over and dropped his hands so that they fell uselessly to his sides.

“Because I _see_ you.”

Adam focused on Ronan then, “ _What_ do you see?”

This was it. This was every time Ronan almost said it. Every time he was _this fucking close_ to telling Adam the truth.

“That you’re beautiful.” Something exploded inside Ronan’s heart.

Adam was gaping, his brow went lax. This was not what he was expecting. _Fuck it_ , Ronan thought. It was all halfway out now.

Ronan step forward when he said, “You’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

Adam dropped his head, bringing the heels of his hands to cover his eyes. He shook his head and making sounds of dismissal and agony.

“What do you want, Adam.” Ronan asked, and honestly didn’t know why he asked it.

Adam dropped his hands and rested them on his hips and Ronan could see the shudder of his shoulders when he exhaled heavily.

“I can’t say it.” he admitted with more shame and guilt than Ronan ever thought possible for someone.

Ronan daringly took a step forward. “Why not.”

When Adam looked at him, Ronan couldn’t stop the surge that lit his veins on fire. “Because I never thought I wanted it.”

“Until now?” Ronan took another step; they were close enough that Ronan could reach out to touch him, but it was still too far.

“Until you.” Adam whispered.

Ronan took another step. Their chests were almost touching now. Adam was staring at him; his chest, his face, finally settling on his eyes. Ronan was fighting restraint.

“Tell me what to do, Adam.”

Without hesitation, Adam’s voice broke when he said, “Please kiss me.”

And that’s all Ronan needed. There was no force, but Ronan didn’t falter when he pressed his lips to Adam. It was barely-there, but electric. It was soft and fire and sweet and painful. It was explosions in his skin. It was his aching heart and it was fucking perfect.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a direct continuation from chapter 1 since i was too tired to continue. this is entirely in adam's point of view.

He kissed him and kept kissing him and kissed him more until he thought they’d never stop. The first touch of tongue from Ronan sent shocks up Adam's spine. There was a weird gentleness to Ronan’s touch, hesitant and almost distant that almost made Adam uneasy. Something completely un-Ronan like. He expected fangs and bites and torn lip flesh. He almost _wanted_ it.  
  
Adam just _wanted_.  
  
There was something he needed, something Ronan had to give him.  
  
Something that ignited his core and made him hungry for everything. It scared the fuck out of him, but it was as if his hands weren’t his own. He couldn’t stop the push of Ronan’s hips against the bed, he couldn’t stop from sending him backwards and half laying between his legs.  
  
His pathetic excuse for a bed creaked under their weight. Ronan’s hands were on Adam’s back, bracing him, tugging at his shirt but not making a move to take it off. He was warm, so warm beneath Adam where their shirts rose just a bit so that their bellies were touching and the sensation of it sent prickles all over Adam’s body. Ronan was making small, surprised, gasping sounds that Adam never thought he’d hear from someone like him. He expected grunts and curses. It was a surprise, but not unwelcomed.  
  
Kissing was new to Adam. To the both of them, if he had to wager. There was no finesse, no grace. Just sloppy, desperate need and hesitation out of the fear of hurting the other. Ronan moved his legs apart just a bit to better accommodate Adam. It was immediate to the both of them that they were extremely hard. Adam couldn’t think of a time when he’d last gotten so hard so fast.  
  
Most of the time he just willed the business away, sat under the cold spray of water, or ignored it until he woke with messy sheets. Sometimes when the agonizing pangs of arousal wouldn't leave him alone, or when he just couldn't sleep, he would take himself in his hand or press himself into the mattress- never lingering too long, never taking the time to get to know himself in this way. Just enough to scratch the itch, so to speak. But this was different and scary and thrilling in a new way; a way he was powerless to stop when Ronan moved his hips just-so and Adam found that Ronan was just as hard as well.  
  
Ronan screwed his eyes shut, Adam barely saw it out of his peripheral because he was currently burying his face in the crook of Ronan’s neck. They made no move to remove their clothes and it didn’t matter anyways.  
  
They were both needing this. Whatever was about to happen.  
  
When Adam began rocking himself against Ronan, he wasn’t thinking. He made himself not think about it, what was happening, how hard Ronan was against his thigh. He couldn’t think about it. It was making his chest hurt and he just wanted it to be over more than anything. Sprinting to the edge of the cliff. It was all he knew, this form of short-spiked pleasure. He didn't know how to make it good, how to make it last, how to feel like he deserved to feel good.  
  
Adam couldn’t let himself think about how perfect Ronan felt. Hard chested, hot breath over his skin. Hands under Adam's shirt to knead and caress the overworked muscles of his back. This was just horrible aching need Adam was too selfish to stop.  
  
His hands were on Ronan’s hips, gripping the bone and muscle and holding them there against the edge of the bed. Ronan wasn’t fighting it but instead seeking more with each of Adam’s sloppy, inexperienced thrusts. Ronan was pressed hard against Adam's thigh, with Adam against his, thrusting hard against one another. The friction of their jeans were just enough, there was no time to worry about taking them off, it felt too good and they were in too much of a rush to dare break apart now. Their mouths met and slid against each other, too distracted with the hurried press and pull of their cocks to perfect one or the other.  
  
It was over as soon as it started. Virginity betraying them both, coming with no warning from either, gripping skin and hands and shoulders and eyes still shut to black it all out. Only Ronan dared to make a noise, a gasp relief of the softest caliber that was probably the purest noise Adam had ever heard. His hand was in Adam's hair, stroking and petting him as Adam forced himself to remain silent. He never liked to be heard. Almost as if he had to keep his pleasure a secret, even now with Ronan so beautifully spent beneath him.

He was shaking when he forced himself to let go of Ronan. His legs developed an ache when he moved to stand and he couldn’t look at Ronan. All he felt was this dead weight of shame in his core. It was heavy and all-consuming.  
  
He didn’t look at him, not even once.  
  
He quickly stammered a, “Sorry,” before stumbling to the bathroom, forcing the door shut. It was another moment before he felt around for the light and flipped it on. It took him a moment to get used to the light, the harsh yellow illumination making everything seem even more shameful. And this was despite their acts in a church, which ironically was the least of Adam’s shame at the moment.  
  
He caught his reflection in the smeary mirror for a moment. There was still dirt on his skin. It fit, didn’t it. Dirty. He wanted to jump out of his skin. Tear it off by his fingernails. Rip and tear at it all.  
  
He started with his shirt. Old and tattered as it was. It fell to the floor carelessly, along with the other articles of clothing collected behind the door he was too lazy to properly put away because it was easier to just grab it off the floor when it was time to go to school or work.  
  
Adam looked himself over. Skin strained over shoulder bones and muscle. Smudges of grease and dirt melded with sweat along the creases of his stomach and elbows. Had he ever _really_ been clean? As often as he showered, did he ever really feel clean? No matter how hard he tried to scrub, he felt exactly how he looked right now. Overworked, underslept, ragged. He was a ghost in his own skin.  
  
He couldn’t stop himself from zeroing in on one scar that ran across his chest. Robert Parrish threw a beer bottle.  
  
_Stupid fucking faggot._  
  
There was a cigarette burn on his shoulder.  
  
_Cocksucking little bastard_.  
  
There was several more on his back. Like a trailer park constellation from hell.  
  
_Do you like that?_  
  
There were scratches around his hips from when fingernails dug too deep.  
  
_You fucking disgust me_.  
  
Burns littered his back from kettles, tire irons, lighters.  
  
_Show me some fucking respect._  
  
He placed a hand over his dead ear, cupping over it like a conch with an insulting hope that maybe there’d be a faint sound. But it was silence.  
  
Adam turned from the mirror, face blank. Even as a million and one memories and voices invaded him demanding attention, he was near-unphased. He turned the first knob of the shower he reached, which happened to be scalding. Without unbuttoning his jeans, he pushed them down over his hips, boxers included, and stepped out of them.  
  
He didn’t acknowledge the mess on his groin, but let the scorching water wash every evidence of his sin away. The water was painful, but it was numbing. Cleansing almost. He couldn’t let himself move the knob to a more comfortable temperature. He stood under the harsh geyser, bending his head so that it pounded at his neck. It hurt so much. But Adam couldn’t let himself move. His chest was beginning to sore, along with his shoulders. But he plugged an ear and closed his eyes. The shower water sounded like rain and he thought of Cabeswater.  
  
He thought of rain on the tin roof of his trailer.  
  
He thought of his father’s snoring.  
  
He thought of the harrowing dreadful silence when it all stopped and Adam saw the looming figure over his bed ready to pick a fight or kill him.  
  
Adam was shaking again thinking about it. He raised his head, letting the water hit his face until he stopped. Until the water stopped hurting. He just wanted it all to _stop_.  
  
He wanted to stop remembering things. He wanted to stop feeling it. He wanted to stop thinking about Ronan. Oh _Ronan_. Angry beautiful Ronan who was currently the ever-dominating force in his mind despite the ghost pains he felt when he looked upon all his bodily horrors.  
  
Ronan. Whose mouth was sweet, eyes were sad, and hands were lingering. Ronan, who when Adam said he wanted to feel, fell onto his back for him and Adam couldn’t even begin to process how it got this way. All except that Ronan deserved better than this. He needed someone better. Not a dangerous lusty letch of a boy who couldn’t control himself.  
  
Finally, when the water began to cool on its own, he turned it off, picked up a towel from the floor near where his jeans fell and wiped himself off. He stilled for a moment, straining to hear for any movement from Ronan. Truthfully he somehow forgot completely about him. He just left him there on his bed. He already knew the argument they were going to have over this one and Adam almost wished it was over already just to get it over with. Or maybe they would just pretend it never happened and that somehow made things worse.  
  
His skin was too red and raw but Adam was too tired to care. He was so tired and all he wanted was to not live for a few hours before it was time to pretend to give a shit about himself or the world again in the morning. That wasn’t fair though. He knew he’d care about everyone else when the sun rose. But for now, there was no patience for everything else. His mind was too far gone and he couldn’t stop himself from thinking and it was killing him.  
  
When Adam turned the light off of the bathroom and opened the door, he didn’t expect to see Ronan still. Sitting on his bed. His desk lamp was on. And somehow that made the room feel smaller. Ronan looked up at him for just a moment but he didn’t seem angry at all.

“Are you okay?” The words shocked Adam and of all the things he expected to hear from Ronan, that wasn’t it. His grip on his towel that hung around his waist was tight.

Adam looked to the floor, focusing on everything that wasn’t those hard eyes. He shrugged and said, “I guess.” He wanted Ronan to leave or yell at him. Something.

He felt raw and exposed.

Instead Ronan sat still and said, “Are you sure?” his voice was gruff in some attempt to sound kind. It just hit Adam like knives. He’d always been a terrible liar.

He hadn’t moved out of the doorway yet and couldn’t still.

“Can you come here, Parrish?” Ronan said softer, tilting his head and sighing. “I’m not going to hurt you, shit.”

A sober-minded Adam would have rebuffed him, arguing for the sake of- because it was what they did. It was a strange constant Adam could always rely on. A harmonious rhythm they found themselves in somehow. But feeling guilty suddenly about they had done, how Adam left him, he took it like an order and stepped forward, a few deliberate steps across the floorboards until he was standing in front of Ronan. Like he was being inspected. Ronan stood and suddenly Adam was aware of the height Ronan had on him - which considerably wasn’t much. Maybe two or three inches at the most, but it felt like so much more. Ronan had a way of feeling like some dominating force to be reckoned with - this all despite how soft his eyes were. He was trying to gentle himself for Adam.

Adam can tell he was looking at him - all of him. The blotchy red patches of skin from where the shower punished him, the dated reminders of justified punishment along his chest, shoulders and torso. It only just occurred to him that Ronan had never seen Adam shirtless and for precisely this reason.

“Adam,” Ronan’s voice was coarse and barely there. Adam had his head turned away. Maybe if he didn’t look at Ronan, maybe if he was somehow able to push all of it out, he wouldn’t cry. That’s all he wanted, was for once to just not fucking cry. He’d been so good before, at holding it all in. That was until Ronan came and obliterated his walls, somehow found a way to curl inside and get a grip around his heart. Everything he was feeling now was in Ronan’s hands. He could love him, crush him, or kill him. It felt like all were happening at the same time.

A whispered, “Fucking Christ, Parrish,” was followed with a small touch of Ronan’s finger to the jagged cut across his chest. Adam couldn’t help the horrible way his breath caught in his throat, as if Ronan burned him. Adam could feel him seeking out permission and when Adam didn’t say anything, his touch became more lingering.

His fingers then found one of the cigarette burns. Adam closed his eyes and that’s when he felt the slightest brush of lips on his skin. The sensation was electric and shocking. But still he kept his eyes closed. It was a small kiss. A simple action, kind and attentive and the most unlikely thing he could  have ever expected Ronan to do.

What was he trying to do? Kiss his scars away? Replace the pain with something else? He wanted to tell Ronan that it was stupid and it wasn’t going to work. The small scars across his skin were three times the size inside and that was something Ronan couldn’t heal - not with touch, not with a kiss. His soul was not a thing easily mended.

But he let Ronan kiss him. Adam let himself have this. He allowed the gentle easy ministrations of lips on his shoulders, hands that found their way on the upper side of his rib cage. There was a flutter somewhere inside of him that sent an echo throughout his darkness and Adam felt it. It was when Ronan’s lips placed a single small kiss on his neck. He opened his eyes and couldn’t handle his breathing. He couldn’t push this out.

Ronan was kissing him. It wasn’t rushed and needy and dirty. He was making this different, somehow. No one had ever touched Adam this way. Not just in the literal sense, but no one had ever been this gentle. The sensations were too much and he wanted to push Ronan away, to make it stop, but it felt _good_ in a way that he wanted more.

Ronan’s hands fell to Adam’s hands where they were still gripping the towel. He covered them with his own, but not making a move to uncoil them. Adam began taking deep breaths, as if bracing himself for something. Ronan caught his gaze and it had been the first time they made eye contact since they were outside the church. Adam felt something surge in his chest when Ronan lifted his head; he was bent over still, from where he kissed the a scar just below his nipple, but he was gradually lifting it to connect his lips to Adam. From this angle, Adam was above him.

This was unlike their previous kisses. It was slow, yielding one another, lips soft and nipping. It was deep and almost romantic, if Adam had to pick a word. Intimate. Coaxing. Too fucking exposing. Ronan was suckling on Adam’s bottom lip when he felt himself loosen up his white-knuckle grip. The towel hung there on his hips for just a moment before the two ends disconnected and sent it pooling around his feet. But Ronan wasn’t focusing on that. He was holding both of Adam’s hands, and then his hips.

Ronan broke their kiss, slowly, with Adam chasing those soft pliant lips as Ronan knelt down. He was close enough for Adam to feel hot shallow breaths billow against his stomach. The muscles instinctively contracted and skin prickled as Adam sought out Ronan's gaze, questioning, confused a moment. A flush of heat spread throughout his chest, blooming from collar to navel. His own breathing became rapid and it felt as though his heart was going to beat right out of his chest. There was an unmistakable  _wildness_ that bristled all his nerve-endings, with him standing so tall and Ronan above him. Knelt as though Adam was something so powerful. 

Adam brought his hands up to gently rest on Ronan's shoulders. Ronan's mouth was hung open, as his eyes bore into Adam in the most hungry and loving way. The closeness suddenly felt like such a real and raw thing, with his own nakedness against Ronan's clothed, with large calloused fingers splayed against his sides. It was a long handful of seconds before Ronan moved, breathing in deep and exhaling with a hot kiss on line of dust-colored hair below Adam's navel. And again just below that. Another at the very top of his thigh. Each kiss open mouthed, wet and lingering, just barely sucking at the tender skin. Adam was gasping, trying so fucking hard to keep it together. But god it felt so good it was almost criminal.

His hands came to cup the whisper soft fine hairs of Ronan's head, screwing his eyes shut. The scene unfolding was too erotic, too _much_ to bear witness to. At almost the same time he did though, Ronan's petal soft lips kissed the tip of his cock and a sharp jolt of pleasure and adrenaline spiked through his spine.

"Jesus  _fuck_ Ronan," he gasped, trying not to grip the back of his head too hard. He forced a hand to fall to his shoulder to keep him steady. But with Ronan's hands on his hips, he wasn't going anywhere. 

He felt, rather than saw, Ronan's smile as he kissed him again. This time letting his lips open over him and sucking just the barest amount. When Adam shuddered roughly, knees nearly buckling, Ronan brought a hand to cup him loosely in his palm. Courtesy of youth and near-inexperience, Adam was rock-hard before he was even able to catch up with himself. Ronan's mouth was on him, over him, around him, and sucking hard. Long, wet pulls of his lips, with cheeks hollowed around him. 

Adam was trying so fucking hard to not thrust into that delicious heat that was Ronan's perfect mouth. But even with the barest push forward of his hips that he couldn't keep himself from, Ronan moaned approvingly. Adam looked down at him, needing to see what was too unbelievable to be happening to him. Ronan's lips were dark red and swollen around his cock. It was obscene and entirely too erotic to be happening to someone like Adam. Ronan's dark eyes locked on his as his mouth slid lower on his cock, testing, waiting. He kept his pace slow, dragging, letting his tongue curl around the head and push into the slit. Adam was groaning now, his jaw was locked tight to keep some semblance of control. But god he didn't want to anymore.

He chewed on his lip, dragging his fingernails around Ronan's scalp. It was beginning to feel too good with hot spikes of pleasure shooting through his skin and warm jerking pulses of his thighs and groin letting him know he was going to come any second if Ronan didn't stop. No, he didn't want to like this. He wanted to come with Ronan, like last time. But better, he wanted to make it better if he could. If Ronan would let him.

He gripped deftly at his shoulders, pawing at him with barely any force. 

"C'mere," he whispered through gritted teeth. "Come up here." 

Ronan obeyed instantly, letting his hands travel up his chest with him. He pressed his forehead to Adam's so their breaths mingled hotly together.

"That was," Adam tried to make sense of something, anything. " _Fuck."_

Ronan's smirk was savagely erotic. "Language, Parrish."

For some reason this made Adam smile, and he kissed him again. Ronan's lips were wet, and warm, and tasted so distinctly like  _Adam_ that he couldn't help the deep blush that was settling so warmly all over. As they kissed, he tasted the hunger on Ronan's tongue, how badly he needed this. How badly he  _wanted_ this, and Adam. He couldn't precisely categorize what the look was that Ronan gave him. No one had ever looked at him so wanting and full of lust before. Adam had seen it before, which why there was a strange hint of familiarity in Ronan's gazes tonight. They were no different than the ones from PE at school, when physical activity was forced. At the Barns when Ronan was left unsupervised. In the car driving anywhere when he thought Adam was asleep. All those looks were full of want and longing and they pulled something tight and strong and similar in Adam's own chest that it almost made no sense how he so easily lied to himself all those times before. How could he just ignore this? How bad Ronan wanted him, how badly he wanted Ronan in return. 

 

With great reluctance and a pull of some noise so  primal and needy form the back of Adam's throat, Ronan pulled apart from their kiss. Lips deep scarlet and glistening even in the darkness. Adam searched his face for something. A warning. A tell-tale sign that Adam had gone and fucked this up. Whatever _this_ was. Ronan let go of Adam’s hips and reached over his shoulder for his muscle tee and pulled it over his head in a swift motion, letting it fall off his hands onto the floor. Next he moved to undo his belt and jeans buttons, before Adam could blink they too were in a pile at his feet.

Adam didn’t look anywhere but his face. It was clear that he was being given permission to look, that Ronan must have wanted them to be the same now. But for the first time, Adam really _really_ looked at Ronan’s face. How did he not realize how _beautiful_ he was? Objectively he knew Ronan was attractive, as he knew Gansey was attractive, and even Noah in his own way. But Ronan. Ronan’s lines stopped seeming harsh and jagged and sharp, but crafted. Elegant. Haunting. It was Ronan. And it had been there the whole time.

Ronan had been there the whole time. Right here. Right in front of him, exposed and wanting. How could he ignore this beautiful face? It was so obvious in a way that was almost funny.

They stood for a moment until Adam dropped his eyes to Ronan’s tattoo, the snake creeping around his neck. That was beautiful too. Adam stepped forward, pressing himself against Ronan fully and placed a quick kiss to it, only to see how Ronan would react. A quick laugh and a long grin escaped him and Adam smiled too. He kissed him again, this time higher. The laugh became a gasp. He reached his jaw and Ronan moaned. Adam found his mouth, claimed it, and Ronan gripped his waist. So much skin touched now, chests, thighs, heartbeats he could feel Ronan’s hardness pressed against his and that made his blood run hotter.

Adam lifted a hand to touch Ronan’s chest. His nails drug against pale skin in the gentlest way he could manage until he found Ronan’s hip muscle, sneaking it around until he found the dip of his back, just above Ronan's ass. He held on there.

When their tongues melded and Adam felt the urge to push Ronan onto his back again, that’s when he stopped. And this time it was Ronan who made the noise of longing disappointment.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he rushed out, moving his head down so Ronan couldn’t kiss him again.

Ronan’s lips found his temple - the spot where he collided with the railing and everything went silent on one side.

“I don’t want-” he couldn’t find the words. “I can’t-”

“Can’t what?” Ronan whispered. It was on the wrong side and Adam almost didn’t hear him.

“Hurt you,” Ronan paused. Adam swallowed thickly. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

Ronan pulled back just enough so he could look at Adam. “You could never hurt me,” he said with a gentle force. “And _I_   would never hurt you. Ever. Understand?”

He nodded despite the gnawing guilt that began to creep again.

Ronan moved back to sit on the bed and pushed himself back far enough so that his legs were off the floor. He had still been holding at least one of Adam’s hands, so Adam was pulled forward as well, forced to kneel on the mattress to meet Ronan. He stood awkwardly for a moment for joining him.

The bed was small, no room to stretch their legs, so they were forced to be close. They wanted to be close. Their legs were wound around each other and the angles were slightly uncomfortable but Ronan was kissing him again so it didn’t matter. This time there was need. Strong and heady and almost desperate. Ronan kept his hands on Adam’s thighs, splayed against the muscle. Adam was slowly wrapping himself around Ronan, needing to be closer.

His father’s voice yelling _faggot_ was only a distant hollar, one Adam could ignore in favor for the noises Ronan was making against him. Some would call this disgusting and sinful. But Adam said, “Ronan,” and all the voices in his head stopped. It was just them. It was okay. Everything was okay. Ronan wanted Adam to touch him and it was good. Ronan touched him back and that was good too.

 _You’re going to be okay_ , he told himself over and over, _You want this. He wants you. It’s okay._

They were kissing and it was slow and sensual and within moments Adam felt himself hard again. He ignored it for a moment, but he couldn’t ignore Ronan, as he was hard too. He felt daring, sick and drunk from his own boldness and Ronan’s permission thereof. This was happening and it was okay.

He felt Ronan’s breath hitch when he moved a hand further down his side, down to his hip. He stopped for a moment, but Ronan nodded against him and made a quick ‘uhuh’ noise so Adam continued. He barely touched himself so touching Ronan was new and thrilling and terrifying as shit. Ronan’s hips bucked some when Adam’s fingers wrapped around the part of Ronan he could barely bring himself to look at. It was hot, alarmingly heavy, but good. It felt really good in his hand. He slowly dragged his hand up from the base until his thumb found the tip. Ronan clenched his fist and dropped his head so that it fell against Adam’s chest. He was breathing so heavy and gritting his teeth and this made Adam feel powerful.

He was making Ronan feel good, circling his thumb across the slit and back down again. Slow, focused pumps, that made Ronan putty against him. He’d never seen Ronan this uncontrolled, this desperate and wanting. His shoulders began to quake when he gripped Adam by his hips and pulled him forward until Ronan was now straddling Adam's lap. Ronan's thighs were strong and spread around Adam's hips and he began kissing him again. He was shamelessly thrusting in Adam's fist, cradling Adam's face to kiss him deep and wet. 

Adam wanted this so badly he almost felt ashamed. But when Ronan touched him there as well, he couldn’t even think about it. Ronan seemed to know exactly how to stroke him, how tight Adam needed it, the spot just beneath his tip that sent Adam quivering against him. It felt like they stayed this way forever. Both equal in their need to please the other. They were thrusting into each other, their cocks so close to touching that Ronan had the genius idea to open his fist and Adam's and grip their cocks tightly together.

Adam gasped suddenly, sharply, from that hot spike of arousal that made his skin hot and prickly, caused pulsating nerve endings to react to every microscopic touch from Ronan. They broke apart for a moment, their foreheads pressed together, to just breath hotly into each other. Their lips so so close. Adam let him control his, falling back onto one elbow so that Ronan was kneeling above him. Adam's hand was gripping Ronan's chest. A thumb caught on a dark rosy nipple that made Ronan quiver and gasp so erotically, Adam sucked on the pad of his thumb, just to do it again and again. Ronan was moaning as they thrust together, their precome easing the friction and making it sweet and electric. 

He made a point to realize that they were lasting considerably longer the second time around than the first. But that was before Ronan sped up his pace, moved his mouth to Adam’s jaw, whispered, “You’re so fucking beautiful,” and Adam was completely done for. Pleasure hit him like a shock to the spine and warmth flooding throughout his limbs from fingers to toes, stars exploding behind his eyes and the hot stripes of his orgasm hitting his chest. His body jerked a second, third, and fourth time as Ronan slowed his hand and Adam fell back into the mattress lax and fuzzy and suddenly very sleepy.

It took him a moment to remember that Ronan still needed to come as well, so he brought his freehand to wrap around his cock. Ronan instinctively fell forward onto Adam's chest. His mouth was on the dip between his shoulder and neck as Adam's other hand came to rest on the back of Ronan's head. He gripped him just a bit tighter and pulled up faster and only three or four strokes, and with a single shout, Ronan was gasping and wrapping his arms around Adam.

They lay there for a moment. Sated, heaving, holding onto one another. Adam rested his chin on Ronan’s shoulder, dragging his fingers across his back, tracing the endless lines of Ronan’s Celtic knot of a tattoo. Ronan lay heaving against Adam's chest, resting his cheek in the crook of his neck.

“I do love you, Adam,” Ronan said after a moment. “So much.”

It struck Adam like a stab in the heart, the sweetness of it.  “You’re the first person to ever say that to me.” He whispered.

“I know.”

Adam felt Ronan smile against him as he nuzzled against his chest. He didn’t know what this feeling was inside him. He felt warm and whole. At least partly. There were dark parts of himself that he may never be rid of. He thought for a moment though, that maybe it was possible for Ronan to replace at least some his scars with kisses.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I started writing this like a month ago and completely forgot about it, so I just decided to finish it since i had some free time.

Ronan didn’t wake, so much as he became suddenly aware that Adam was the warm gentle weight against him. Though there was no way he could have forgotten. He felt the steady heartbeat permeate through his back against Ronan’s chest. Somehow they had managed to detangle themselves to lay properly under the covers. Adam was facing the wall, Ronan curled against him holding him there. Adam was snoring gently and soundly and Ronan didn’t have the heart to move and dare wake him when he couldn’t let himself sleep again. He was remembering everything - they had kissed and touched and loved each other only a while before.

Ronan told Adam that  he loved him and he meant it. He knew Adam couldn’t say it back even if he wanted to. There was something there in his head that wouldn’t let him. But it didn’t matter. Ronan didn’t  need to hear it and he would love Adam anyways. Just the realization and saying it outloud was more than Ronan ever thought possible for himself. And yet it had always been true.

Adam’s hair was mostly dry now and Ronan allowed himself to press his nose against the nape of his neck, breathing him in. He closed his eyes and wondered what Adam was dreaming of. If he was okay, inside. If some part of the storm that brewed and wrecked him was calmed for a moment. God he hoped so. He hoped that in the quiet of this bed and this room and with Ronan holding him, he wasn’t living in torment. He wished that for a moment, he could make Adam forget about the cuts and bruises and scars and the fear that came with all of that.

For some reason he remembered drinking; scaring Gansey by going off on a bender. Gansey always called Adam. He wondered if Adam looking for Ronan’s sorry ass resulted in one of those scars that littered Adam’s chest.

It absolutely broke him and flooded his chest with a sudden heavy guilt that only made Ronan cling tighter in silent apology.

Ronan wasn’t used to calm gentle things. He was used to fast and dangerous and destructive and numbing. He never let himself sit in the hyper awareness that came with sobriety for too long. He had never slept next to a beautiful boy before this. Kissed the scars of a breaking boy. Touched the face of boy who before this, didn’t know that he was loved.

He never let himself be touched or kissed or loved. He realized that now.

But here he was.

There was such a rightness with the rise and fall of Adam’s chest against Ronan’s hand that left his entire body buzzing. Adam was just so _warm_. Surely moreso than Adam thought he was capable of being. His skin was soft, hands course with days of endless toiling, stomach tight with the musculature of a worker. It was only a few moments later when Ronan felt on of Adam’s hands reach up to feel Ronan’s against his chest. Smoothing his fingers across the back of his hand as if to make sure it was a tangible thing.

Adam stirred, the barest amounts of pressure pressing against Ronan’s lower abdomen.

He took Ronan’s hand, lifted it from his chest, allotting himself enough space to turn over to face Ronan. His eyelids were still hanging low with drowsiness. Their foreheads were barely touching, even in the darkness Ronan could make out the shadowed splatter of freckles across the bridge of Adam’s nose. Ronan’s arm was still draped over Adam, while Adam’s hands were folded in on themselves near Ronan’s chest.

“Why are you awake,” Ronan said beginning to draw small circles on Adam’s spine. “Go back to sleep.”

“Can’t.” Adam whispered, breath warm against Ronan’s chest. “Can’t stop thinking.”

“Stop, its bad for you.”

A hint of a smirk pulled at the corner of Adam’s mouth and Ronan found himself really wanting to kiss him again. He could still feel the tingling of his own mouth from when their lips pressed together until they were numb. Kissing Adam was like drowning in the best way possible. He tasted like summer, like rain, and like heat.

Adam found one of Ronan’s hands between them, and pressed their palms together. “What are you thinking about,”

He shook his head, “I don’t know. Everything?”

“You alright though, Adam?”

He shrugged. “In general or right now?”

“Both, I guess.”

Adam brought his eyes up to look at Ronan, their foreheads brushing slightly. “In general, I don’t know. Probably not.”

Ronan felt Adam’s legs stretch against his own, one hooking over his knee, their calves pressing together.

“But right now,” Adam smiled, “I think I’m alright.”

_I called him beautiful._

“You will be, you know,” Ronan felt himself saying softly.

_I told him I'd never hurt him_.

“Thanks,”

They laid there for a few moments more, in the quiet hum of the three am hour. In and out of sleep they didn’t want to miss each other- as if they were both intangible objects they had to keep tethered to themselves, lest they wake up and the other be gone. They kissed gently, but no more than that. Small, slow kisses peppered across exposed skin. Adam rolled on top of Ronan, Ronan rolled between Adam’s legs and laid on his chest. Hands found hips, arms, necks.

Finally Ronan fell asleep there; a drowsy dreamless sleep lulled by the metronome of Adam’s heartbeat. Adam’s fingers were on the back of Ronan’s head, gentling his neck, strumming the too-short hairs of his buzzed head.

 

He woke with the sunrise, and with the feeling of Adam’s semi-erection in his abdomen. He bit back a smile as he crawled up on his elbows. He held himself above Adam for just a moment before Adam stirred awake too. His eyes fluttered open and found Ronan’s gaze.

He smiled this time, broader, reaching up to rest his hands on Ronan’s sides.

He said, “Hey,” in that drawl of his, not even trying to hide his accent.

“Hey yourself,” Ronan said glancing between them and back at Adam, who began to blush instantly.

“Sorry,” he said sheepishly, but not entirely ashamed. He brought the back of his hand up to rub sleep away from his eyes before stretching languidly beneath Ronan.

Adam was looking at Ronan as if waiting to be kissed, eyes bright and color high on his cheeks- so he did. Adam met him halfway, pressing their mouths together in a slow push and meld of lips and tongue. It was dizzying with the added touch of Adam’s finger tips to Ronan’s jaw. His chest was warming with Adam clinging to him.

When Ronan pulled away, Adam made a small sound of disappointment that made something in Ronan’s chest explode and his fingers itch. He pulled himself up and sat back on his heels while Adam laid back against the pillows. His legs were somewhat wrapped around Ronan, but mostly the limbs were lazy with sleep still. All Ronan could, and wanted to do, was stare at him. In the morning light, sun bright through the window made Adam seem to glow in splendour. The slopes and lines and dips of skin over muscle across bone were soft and warm and inviting.

He’d never been granted the opportunity to look at Adam like this in full light, before him bare and open. All the scars and tan lines and perfect imperfections that made him up. Before he’d only been granted the opportunity to steal glances here and there, losing his subtlety gradually. He remembers the first time he saw Adam at Aglionby; sixteen, skinny, smaller, wide-eyed and soft-cheeked. That was not the case now. His shoulders had filled out, his arms and legs stretched out, his biceps fuller. Ronan spent so much time pretending not to notice, but it was impossible not to.

Adam brought an arm over his eyes, either to block out the sun or Ronan’s lingering gaze.

“Stop lookin’ at me like that,” There was no accent.

“Why?” Ronan said bringing his hands to rest on Adam’s thighs.

“‘Cus it’s embarrassin’, that’s why.”

Ronan couldn’t think of any sort of snarky joke to make. There was none that seemed to fit. Instead, like a whisper he said, “You can look at me too, you know.”

Adam absolutely leveled him. He kinda understood it then, why Adam looked away when he stared at him. His eyes travelled all over him, taking him in. He felt his cheeks begin to burn with the openness between them and he dropped his head a little.

“What’re we doing, Ronan?” Adam said softly, turning his head to one side.

“Well there’s a few things we _could_ be doing,” Ronan said with a smirk, drawing circles on Adam’s thighs.

Adam smiled despite himself and blinked slowly, his eyes lidded. “You know what I mean.” He swallowed thickly as Ronan’s fingernails began to drag over his skin and it prickled with arousal.

“Is this gonna be something we don’t talk about. Something we keep a secret and it only happens when we’re sad and lonely.”

Something in Ronan shattered, if he ever gave Adam that impression, he was angry at himself for it. If they stopped before Adam came out of the shower, then he could understand why Adam would think that. But after that, when Ronan kissed all over him and they took their time and fell into one another, he thought his intentions were plain as day. This was probably something swimming in his head that didn’t make sense to Ronan, but that Adam needed to clarify for himself. Probably a question directed at himself more than anything.

“Adam,” Ronan knew he was hearing him now, whenever he said Adam’s name, “I’m not ashamed. Not of this. Whatever you want _this_ to be, if you want it to be anything at all.”

Adam brought his hands up to touch Ronan’s. Just barely. His first and middle fingers wove between Ronan’s and locked there.

“I used to think I knew everything,” he said with painful honesty. Ronan could see him forcing the words out. “I had to ignore it all to make anything make sense... Now it’s just… fucked up.”

Adam was clinging to Ronan’s hands now and Ronan was clinging onto his words. “Everything’s a scattered mess… inside. I don’t know what’s wrong with me sometimes.”

He sat up, his legs still around Ronan’s hips, so that they were eye level now. Ronan wanted to kiss him so bad. His heart was aching from longing and sadness for Adam.

“All I kinda know how is what feels okay,” Adam leaned in closer, brushing his nose against Ronan’s cheekbone, breathing him in. “And what doesn’t.”

The actions weren’t seductive nor were the words. But Ronan was hanging onto them anyways.

“I don’t want this because _you_ want me. I wanna want you back, Ronan. In the same way.”

Ronan pulled back just a little to look at him. His hands that were somewhere near his hips hugged the bones there. He didn’t mean to look skeptical but with what Adam was saying, it was hard not.

He said, “Do you?” pulling his brows together.

Adam shrugged, barely.

“I keep hearing my dad’s voice in my head. He uh...” Adam’s voice was getting shaking, the shame was beginning to settle in him again. “But then _you_ happen and I don’t know.”

Adam leaned forward to rest against Ronan’s shoulder, much as he did the night before. He was beginning to fall in love with Adam laying against him like this. Giving himself to him. Finding simple refuge right here. They sat like that for a moment until Ronan felt a hot tear roll onto his chest. Adam sniffed once. He picked his head up to look at Ronan.

Ronan was gutted to the core. Adam’s eyes were red and full with water but his face was unchanged, as if he didn’t realize he was crying. Like it was an uncontrollable occurance.

“The point is I want you, Ronan,” Adam then said. “ _I do_. My dad, he’ll kill me if-”

“And I’ll fucking kill him if I ever see him again.” Ronan cut him off. He’d never been more serious about anything in his life. If the cops never showed up that night, he would have killed Robert Parrish. He wanted to. He would have beat him to a pulp until his own fingers were broken and dislodged from their sockets. Beating Adam’s father was the single most satisfying thing he’d ever done in his entire life - and he’d do it again in a heartbeat if he could.

Adam didn’t say not to, he didn’t even roll his eyes in the way he normally did when Ronan talked about acts of violence. He nodded solemnly and said, “I know you would.”

Ronan brought a hand up Adam’s side to rest on the side of his neck. “You don’t gotta be scared, Parrish. Not of that stupid sack of inbred shit.”

He nodded again, “I know. I _know_ that. I don’t think I am though,” Adam looked up, blinking away the tears and wiping them away immediately. “Not anymore. Not with you.”

Ronan’s smile was small, satisfactory. He wanted to kiss Adam again, but waited. Waited for the easy exhale of breath from him, the slow lean in, and the gentle, barely present press of lips. He let Adam kiss him softly, letting the kiss take the place for what words he still can’t say. He’d welcome anything Adam had to give.

The sun was rising and the world around them was beginning to wake up. It was a Saturday morning and the clamor of Henrietta was beginning. Car engines turning over, neighbors greeting each other with good mornings and how are yous, the nuns and church staff below beginning their morning routines. Ronan kissed Adam slowly and sweetly while his finger traced lines across his back.  

When Adam asked what he was writing, Ronan said “Don’t worry about it.”

_ nunc scio quid sit amor _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _nunc scio quid sit amor_ \- "now I know what love is"


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes being someone's _someone_ wasn't easy. Sometimes Adam thought about it too hard and honest to God couldn't tell if he was doing anything right and often times wondered why Ronan was with him at all. But this... this was good. This was the easiest thing. These moments in the BMW on nights like this on empty street corners, just them. This was so good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this was written while listening to [Moonlight](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qBQ1NWPb2Ro) by Mono on repeat. i implore you to do the same.

Not a single thing changed while dating Ronan Lynch and yet everything different. There was an unspoken shift in the air and it was a tangible, electric thing. They still drove around Henrietta, but just a little bit longer. They still argued over nothing, but they didn’t let each other storm out the room without following. They still followed one another in completely dangerous behavior for fun, but they didn’t mind the other tending bloody knees, elbows, and lips. Touches lingered just a little longer. Gazes went unchecked and left wild.

Dating Ronan Lynch was in some ways difficult, but not because Ronan was a difficult person to date. He imagined what it had to be like with Blue, the type of boyfriend he needed to be. The kind that bought flowers and paid for dates. That’s what boyfriends did. Of course he soon realized that Blue didn’t need that from Adam and neither did Ronan. So in all actuality, he had no _idea_ how to date Ronan Lynch. And yet, the boy who was driving the sleek black BMW didn’t seem to care. He didn’t seem to want, need, or expect gestures of grandeur or paid dates or anything that Adam didn’t have the time or money to provide.

The only difference between dating Ronan and dating Blue, besides the many, was that Blue didn’t want to date Adam and Ronan did. But likewise, Adam didn’t want to date Blue anymore. He wanted Ronan. He _wanted_ Ronan.

There was simplicity where Adam expected rules and structure. Dating Ronan Lynch meant there were no rules. He had to have known that, surely.

But that didn’t mean that things were by any means easier. He couldn’t place a name on it. He knew what he’d done wrong with Blue. He knew where he went wrong. Adam promised himself he wasn’t going to make the same mistakes. Say the wrong things. Do the wrong things. He wanted to be enough for Ronan. He prayed he was.

When Adam needed to tend Cabeswater, he reminded himself that it was okay to invite Ronan. The magic that flowed in their veins was a mutual thing, tied by the forest - Ronan would want to come. He asked him with a furrowed brow, looking away, casually offering the company and following it shyly with, “If you want to,” and Ronan always rolled his eyes, grabbed his jacket and keys and led the way to his BMW.

The sun was nearly set when they drove out of the forest, not rushing to go back to Adam’s apartment. Their skin was alive and tingling with energy and there was a settled rightness between them. Like waking up from a long nap. Fixing Cabeswater _together_ was somehow more intimate than anything physical touching. It was a melding of their souls, a reminder that Adam had one at all. They didn’t go out to movies or fancy dinners. They wandered around a magical forest and spoke to trees and it was almost humorous in a way when Adam really thought about it.

Adam looked down at Ronan’s hand where it lazily rested on the stick shift. There had been many drives, long before they came together, when their rare drives alone were tense and still so weirdly intimate, when Adam thought back on it. Ronan’s hand would be gripping the stick shift so tightly he sometimes mused if one day it would just snap right off or crush into dust in his palm. He didn’t realize that there was another version of Ronan who was calm and relaxed, and that was him now. Adam felt a small twinge of privilege that _he_ got to be the one who saw it.

Adam took Ronan’s hand in his and Ronan let him. He ignored the swell of fondness that began to bloom in his chest. The gesture didn’t mean anything.

He traced the lines of Ronan’s palm with his finger, fitting it in the grooves and pressing gently into the warmth. Adam traced his fingers with his and catalogued each callus and soft bit of flesh, the delicate hairs that scattered the back of his hand, the tender skin on his wrists and the blue and green veins that protruded in an X and spiderwebbed into his palm.

“Gonna tell my fortune, Parrish?” Ronan casually asked, keeping his eyes on the road. His fingers curled in briefly to touch Adam’s.

“ _Magician_ , Lynch,” Adam sighed. “Can’t tell the future.”

Ronan huffed something that was presumed to be a laugh. Adam just smiled.

The veins dipped beneath the leather bands Ronan always wore on his wrist. Five knots. He never knew Ronan to ever adorn himself with necklaces or earrings or anything flashy. Five strips of leather as if cut from a belt, Adam imagined because that was the most Ronan-like thing he could think of. Hand-made bracelets from a $200 belt.

When he looked closely, when he pushed them up his wrist just a bit, just enough, that’s when he felt Ronan tense. They hid the soft, white jagged scar. It was at its deepest just beneath his palm, where the scar was puffiest. Adam swallowed dry and Ronan closed his hand into a fist.

“You have scars,” he said because it was true and because he didn’t know what else to say. He looked over to see Ronan’s jaw clenched shut, the muscle shifting beneath his stubbled skin.

Adam tentatively pressed a finger to the silky stretch of skin there, soft and without a hair. Finally, he closed his palm over it, to feel Ronan’s heartbeat in his hand.

“You never talk about it,” Adam’s voice was low, just above a whisper. “The accident.”

He felt Ronan shift again. His voice was gruff and almost strained when he said, “It wasn’t what you think,” like he needed to defend himself, “I didn’t mean to.”

“I know, Ronan,” Adam held his wrist tighter. “I know.”

He wasn't sure if that was at all true. Adam knew there was a hurt in Ronan that traumatized him from the inside out. His father's death was the crux of it all. Ronan so young, finding the one person he idolized the most lying beaten bloody in the driveway. Adam couldn't even begin to imagine the sort of pain that ate away at him and gnawed at his soul and raged his dreams. He knew that even if he didn't mean to hurt himself,  _now_ , the Ronan from a year ago was a completely different person. But it wasn't Adam's place to say that. 

For a moment, all the sound that passed between them was slickness of the asphalt beneath the BMW and the roar of engine.

“You still don’t talk about it,” Adam said again.

“You never talked to me about _yours_.” Normally, Adam would have taken this as an offence, but he knew Ronan wasn’t saying it to be nasty because it was true.

It was another long silence and neither of them were angry, when Adam knew what this sort of discussion could have turned into.

“It was an accident, Parrish,” Ronan sighed finally. He looked over at Ronan then, raising his eyebrows as if to say, _What else do you want me to say?_ “I got too drunk, dreams got too dark. Got patched up and went on my merry way _the end_.”

“You almost died, Ronan.” Adam didn’t know why he wanted to talk about this, or why Ronan wasn’t.

He remembers that night, Gansey’s frantic call that Adam almost didn’t understand because he was crying so hard. _Ronan tried to - There’s so much blood - He almost - We don’t know_. Adam remembers being too calm about the whole situation, stunned, more than anything. He snuck out of his trailer, rode his bike fifteen miles to the hospital in under an hour. He couldn’t feel his legs and he didn’t lock up his bike and he ran three flights of stairs because the elevators were out of order to find Declan pacing, Matthew crying, and Gansey crouched on the floor against the wall.

_Ronan tried to kill himself,_ that’s what everyone kept saying. He had a alcohol level that alone should have killed him and gashes in his wrists that were wrapped thick with clean white gauze.

_Ronan slashed his wrists and wanted to die_ , that was the conclusion of the night. It was too thick to swallow and Adam’s head couldn’t wrap around it enough to process each of the words into a complete thought.

The weeks after were an angry sobriety of forced medication and lectures from Gansey that left Ronan storming out of Monmouth and ordering Adam to follow so they could throw rocks at abandoned buildings or kick in windows at the abandoned junk yard. Adam never asked and Ronan never told and that’s just how things were. Maybe he should have, then. But it felt like all he needed was to break something. And hell Adam did too. There was something thrilling about not talking and breaking things.

“It was an _accident_ ,” Ronan said again, but Adam wasn’t sure if he was saying it to himself or Adam. “I was.. I don’t know. I was _fucked up_.”

“And now?”

Ronan looked over to Adam and held his gaze, his eyes softened for reassurance. “Better,” he swore, “ _now_.”

Adam believed him.

“You can’t leave me just yet.”

Ronan looked at him and wanted to say something, but didn’t.

 

They drove for a while longer, Adam realizing that Ronan was taking the long way back to Henrietta. He did that more often now on their drives together. He thought of it almost as sweet - the notion that Ronan wanted to drive just a little bit longer with Adam next to him. Especially since almost always coming back from Cabeswater, they went back to Adam’s apartment together anyways. Sometimes they talked, sometimes they didn’t.

It was when they finally reached town and the stars began to twinkle overhead and the red of the stop light on the main street filled the BMW did Adam say, “I lost my memory in DC.”

By that time, Ronan was holding Adam’s hand on his thigh. “What?”

Adam wasn’t sure why he felt the needed to say it, why now. Ronan never mentioned his accident and Adam never mentioned his accident at Gansey’s party.

“Me and Gansey got into a fight,” he continued, with Ronan’s eyes boring into him. “I don’t know what happened. The next day, pretty much the _end_ of the day, I’m on the side of the free way. No idea how I even got there.”

Ronan’s mouth opened and his eyes widened.

“Gansey never told me,” he turned to look out the window. The light turned green and he surged forward. “I asked him how you did when he got back. He didn’t tell me.”

Adam clutched his hand, “Please don’t be mad.”

Ronan wasn’t mad, Adam could see it then. He was scared. Cabeswater made him more in tuned to what Ronan was feeling and it was fear. He could see him tearing over every _what if_. What if something happened to Adam. What if he got lost and Gansey never found him. What if he never came home. Adam wanted to tell him that he thought about every what if a thousand times over.

Adam leaned over and tried to find Ronan’s gaze. “I’m better now, though.” It took him a moment but Ronan finally gave in when he stopped at the street corner where St. Agnes sat. The street was completely empty and it was dark in the car.

“I am.”

Ronan leaned forward just a bit to brush their noses together and then their lips. His kiss was soft, as Ronan’s kisses always were until Adam pushed back, opening his mouth and tasting Ronan’s lips. Adam brought a hand to cup Ronan’s jaw because he loved the feeling of his skin when he skipped a shave and the barest suggestions of bristles were rough against the pads of his fingers. He loved the feeling of Ronan’s sharp inhale and the warm exhale of breath against his face when he did that. He loved the feeling of Ronan following his kiss wherever Adam wanted to lead it.

Ronan asked him to do dangerous stunts and Adam always said okay. Adam said nothing but yielded Ronan’s mouth to his with no hesitation and it was thrilling in a way that almost made him feel guilty.

He pulled away for a moment to see Ronan instinctively follow and then his brows furrow. It made him smile.

Ronan opened his eyes and they sat that way for a moment, just looking at each other.

Adam said, “I love you,” because he always meant it and now he could say it. Because it was easy and it was true.

Ronan swore with a broad smile and kissed him again because he knew Adam would let him.

Sometimes being someone's _someone_ wasn't easy. Sometimes Adam thought about it too hard and honest to God couldn't tell if he was doing anything right and often times wondered why Ronan was with him at all. But this... this was good. This was the easiest thing. These moments in the BMW on nights like this on empty street corners, just them. This was so good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> huzzah i've finally gotten to updating this fic. i'm thinking of working on a format of like vingnettes?? instead of trying to follow a plot, ja feel


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